Ex-Va. leader decries Lyons

s his Richmond radio audience listened, former Virginia Gov. Doug
Wilder offered one of the harshest assessments yet of the National
Baptist Convention USA's leader.

Douglas Wilder[AP photo: Scott K. Brown]

The Rev. Henry J. Lyons is "a sham and a shylock," he said.

"That kind of money that this man has wasted and spent . . . he
should be denounced for what he is," Wilder said this week during
his popular WRVA-AM talk show. He "pilloried the people."

Wilder, who in 1989 became the nation's first elected African-American
governor, last month was named president of Virginia Union University,
a historically black school founded more than a century ago by
Baptists.

Lyons was appointed to the board of trustees of that Richmond
school in 1994, a distinction that comes with being president
of the National Baptist Convention.

One day after Wilder's radio comments this week, Lyons quit the
board.

It remained unclear Wednesday whether Lyons quit voluntarily or
was forced to resign. Last year, under fire from NAACP leaders,
Lyons resigned from the NAACP's national board.

Henry Lyons[Times photo: Jim Stem]

Lyons, accused in state and federal court of using the convention
to launder money and finance a lavish lifestyle, had no comment
on Virginia Union, according to a written statement from his attorney,
Grady Irvin.

Wilder, who takes over as Virginia Union's president in two weeks,
could not be reached. During the weekly radio show, however, Wilder
told a caller that he already had been assured Lyons would be
removed from the school's board.

Virginia Union's 30-member board of trustees meets three or four
times a year, but Lyons has not attended those gatherings, Wilder
said.

Wilder's comments followed other indications that support for
Lyons may be eroding.

The Virginia state branch of the convention recently issued a
statement distancing itself from the Baptist leader.

The statement, adopted unanimously during the state's convention,
urged church leaders to "disassociate themselves from un-Christian
behavior and set in motion responsible rules and regulations,
with proper checks and balances, that will ensure the highest
ideals and standards of conduct," the Richmond Times-Dispatch
reported.

Wilder praised the Virginia Baptists for their statement. Their
silence, he told his radio audience, would have suggested consent.

Wilder himself graduated from Virginia Union University in 1951.
The school, which once was housed at the site of a former slave
jail, currently has 1,700 students.

The 67-year-old Wilder is the grandson of slaves. First elected
to the Virginia Senate in the late 1960s, Wilder, a Democrat,
has worked as a lawyer and teacher since he left the governor's
office in 1994. He made a brief run for president in 1992 and
remains active behind the scenes in the commonwealth's political
maneuvering.

Their co-defendant, Bernice Edwards, has yet to enter a plea.
On Wednesday, the Milwaukee woman made a brief appearance in Tampa's
federal courthouse, but her arraignment was again put off.

Minutes before a hearing scheduled for noon, Edwards, known for
her taste for expensive diamonds and designer clothes, arrived
at the courthouse in the rain. A dozen reporters and photographers
chased her into the building. They shouted questions. "Are you
trying to sell your jewelry?"

Edwards said nothing.

In a small hearing room, Edwards took notes in a personal organizer
until the judge began asking her routine questions. Had Edwards
seen the charges against her? "Yes, I have, your honor," Edwards
said firmly. Did she understand them? "Yes I do, your honor."

Tony Black, an attorney in the state case against Edwards, requested
a delay, saying Edwards has not formally hired Black's firm to
represent her in the federal case. Black's partner, Bill Jung,
has handled much of Edwards' legal work in the past few months,
Black said. Jung left for a European vacation days before Edwards
was indicted.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Ken Lawson objected to the delay.

Lawson suggested a shortage of cash was preventing Edwards from
signing a deal with her defense team. If Edwards is indigent,
Lawson suggested, she can be assigned a public defender.

Bernice Edwards receives a foreclosure notice from process server
Russell Napier, on a house she bought with Henry Lyons.[Times photo: Andrew Innerarity]

Calling Edwards' need for a delay "not frivolous or unjustified,"
U.S. Magistrate Elizabeth A. Jenkins reset the arraignment to
next Wednesday.

Leaving, Edwards again was chased by reporters shouting questions.
She ignored them.

But someone else was waiting.

"Are you Bernice Edwards?" a man demanded, shoving a piece of
paper into Edwards' hands.

The man was a process server, trying to give Edwards notice of
the foreclosure claim filed against her this week by a savings
and loan company.

World Savings and Loan alleges that it is owed more than $450,000
it loaned to the Rev. Henry J. Lyons to purchase a waterfront
Tierra Verde home he owns with Edwards.

Edwards climbed into a waiting car and Black, the lawyer, took
the foreclosure notice. -- Times staff researcher Jerry Nagle contributed to this report,
as did the Associated Press.